The subject of the present invention is a motor vehicle door, in an interior face of which there is an opening, this door comprising a module fitted with equipment including a lock and a window lifter with at least one rail for guiding cables. The module includes an interior trim panel on which the said equipment items are mounted.
Patent FR-A-89/08550 (2,648,762) discloses a vehicle door comprising a panel forming an interior structure, and an interior trim panel fitted with various items of equipment pressed against the interior structure.
The system for holding the window lifter rail on the panel may be flexible and this rail is fixed at its lower end to a support and mounted in its upper part with freedom to move in a direction transverse to the overall plane of the module. The lock, secured to a lateral lug fixed to one of the rails of the window lifter, is fitted behind the interior panel of the door in which the lateral opening is made. This lock is connected by linkages to a device for controlling the opening of the door from the inside, this device usually being fixed to the interior panel of the door above the lateral opening.
Once the door module has been fitted, it is fixed to the interior panel of the door by appropriate means (screws) by virtue of an opening made in the upper part of the interior trim panel for allowing the introduction of screw-fastening tools.
These known arrangements have the following drawback: if after mounting and fixing the interior trim panel with its equipment items, the operator wishes to access the lock, the window lifter, the motor or its electronics, he has to remove the entire interior trim panel, which is a lengthy and tricky operation.
The object of the invention is to provide a vehicle door which is modified to eliminate this drawback.
According to the invention, the door is characterized in that in the upper part of the panel there is an opening, against the periphery of which there may be removably fitted an additional insert which forms a constituent part of the said panel and to which a support for the lock is fixed.
Thus, after the interior trim panel and all its equipment items have been fixed to the interior door panel, including the lock, it is possible to access this lock and extract it from the door without difficulty simply by removing the removable insert.
This removal of the insert raises no particular difficulty. According to one feature of the invention, the lock support is a lateral lug secured to the insert and on the end of which the lock is mounted.
According to another feature of the invention, the control for opening the lock from the inside is advantageously mounted on the insert.
As this control for opening from the inside is connected to the lock by an actuating linkage, removing the insert allows the lock and its control for opening from the inside to be extracted from the door at the same time.